We Walked Amongst the Roses
by Unfortunate
Summary: You hide a man of his nature behind the most simply elegant face you’ll see and he’ll be in your heart, poison your mind. Miasma on your soul, cigarette in your eyes. Lights up the night and chokes your breathe from your very body.


*We Walked Amongst the Roses*  
  
By: Unfortunate  
  
Disclaimer: Verily disclaimed. Poem by Icecoolers, edited by Unfortunate  
  
~  
  
Is it not enough to say that I loved? That I gave it all up for those moments of joy to love him as he is?  
  
I doubt.  
  
He had eyes like storms and a face for an angel. Cheekbones cut a fine line in his face and made him seen older, dignified, then anyone I'd thought I could see. His clothes were impeccable no matter the occasion.  
  
I doubt I could have loved any one more then he. He looked so beautiful. Of course, that was the general point. You hide a man of his nature behind the most simply elegant face you'll see and he'll be in your heart, poison your mind. Miasma on your soul, cigarette in your eyes. Lights up the night and chokes your breathe from your very body.  
  
He didn't care about me as such, but what does it matter? If you worshipped an angel would you accept him to love you back? I never did, but I want him to know of my affections, however much my brothers might disapprove.  
  
His only flaw was evident, though hidden by his sleeve. I never wondered why he wore full sleeves, even in the summer's ardor. There was a mark on his arm. I was not alone in my speculation that he was a worshipper of the Dark Lord, but I was alone in knowing what it looked like, what it did to his eyes....  
  
What it did to his heart.  
  
When I went against the world and with my own wishes I saw what it was to be in a position of certain power. I was the personal slave of Mr. Malfoy, and proud of my standing. No one else knew of what little arrangement we had, what pretense of friendship we presented.  
  
On cold autumn nights I remember the trail my perfect little devil prince led me on. It was the week before school, I was 17, and he was all of 18. I had told my mother that I was in Diagon Alley and she believed it. Instead I was at Malfoy Manor fulfilling my most empty desires.  
  
He took my hand in his velvet gloved one and he started to run. I had never seen him run before, the world waited for him. But, here I was, with a forbidden man, running in an illicit land.  
  
He led me through his gardens. They were his mother's roses, though they were wilting. Narcissa had been murdered by Lucius, who in turn had turned his head to the noose, in the very gardens his wife had grown, in the very gardens I was running through.  
  
I was in a fur coat of red, such as I could never afford. Underneath were a thin nightgown and a pair of breakneck shoes with rhinestones picking out the straps. I fell against him a few times, but he caught me. We came to the entrance of the gardens and he bent to the ground and kissed my ankles, removed the shoes, slipped off the coat, took me racing down the covered world of roses.  
  
He ran. The ground was covered in brambles, remains of an orderly life, what I had given up to go with him if only for a little while. Time seemed endless. Thorns scratched my ankles bloody, tore up that precarious gown. We ran through blood and roses that day.  
  
That night after the evening had passed I lay in his arms in what had been his parent's bedroom. He was pouring me wine in a crystal glass, as deep a red as the blood my veins cried when the white skin was broken. He held my hand in his, wrapped around the glass and kissed my knuckles, licked them.  
  
"Darling, my little girl, do you know how to get anything you desire? Anything at all," he said with that silken, drawling accent. I shook my head. I could never speak well in his presence, and felt like a silly backward fool to him. "The only way to get what you desire is to know what others desire. What do you desire my pretty lonely girl?"  
  
I'd said nothing at the time although at night, when I think back, I wish I'd said "I desire to be yours". Maybe he'd have accepted my proposal if only to keep him occupied, to have a silly little girl of his very own.  
  
I had gone to Hogwarts that year so desperately alone. He'd been my entire little world for almost three years, only to the second year being not just in my mind. Days seemed endless, horror music of such great intensity to make you sweat bled into my soul, cutting into my mind.  
  
My teachers thought I was mad.  
  
I had a boyfriend that year, whom I could almost pretended was Master Malfoy, lord of the roses. He'd thought I was twisted at the end of it. I liked blood and roses. I could not abide to drink wine unless it was that scarlet shade. I loved the cold and I loathed his touch.  
  
I got through my NEWTS, finally. I passed with flying colors, and was welcomed home to a hero's place, where I faded like a rose covered with snow. Harry Potter with his charming air and tortured boy's looks made all others become overlooked.  
  
I left home. I ran away, leaving only a note which I wrote in red ink. I said, "Goodbye, I'll be home" and that was all.  
  
When I arrived at his Manor he was the one who opened the door.  
  
The Manor was spotless, as if dirt was afraid to settle on the cold furniture. He was unspoiled too, his cheeks burning with a royal obsession, his ever spiraling circle downward. He took my hand to his lips. I came with nothing.  
  
He led me in his circles, accused me of teasing him. "I could slit you from navel to the pretty dimple on your chin, darling. I wouldn't feel any guilt. I never have," he whispered into my ear at dinner once. I shivered, though I believe it was from the chill. He dressed me in bare shouldered gowns because he liked to kiss my arms.  
  
When I had spent a year in his company, and many times washed away blood from his hands, I walked in the snow. The Manor walls were blank and staring. I was crying at the time. Tears froze on my eyelashes. I was alone on this plain of unsullied ice. He'd left me, and I knew where he was. I had a basin ready in our chambers to wash the blood that he spilled away. The end of the Dark Lord's regime was near and he seemed sure to end it.  
  
It was in that night, he was dressed in his turtleneck with a pair of black slacks, simple for him. I was throbbing from the pain that the cold started and the warmth awakened. My lips hurt from a single searing kiss he'd stolen. He was now looking out onto the snow.  
  
"It's ending. I know you don't care, but I feel I should give you a warning. The Mark on my arm is gone and yet I am accused. On our unholy relationship God has averted his eyes. None know you are here and you can leave. I would desire you to leave," he said, still staring at the snow.  
  
"I don't care what you think, but I know I will stay with you until the end," I said tragically. He didn't turn around slowly, but rather, all at once.  
  
He shoved me onto the bed and I fell. I turned my eyes away from his haunted, sinfully beautiful features. He kissed me savagely on the throat and brought a dagger to my neck.  
  
"You could have saved me," he hissed. "I could have been holy, saintly. I could have been wonderfully, simply pure and instead you just cleaned my hands," he broke off in a ragged whisper. He threw me to the floor and a single tear caressed his cheek before falling into his hands which ground his face furiously. His eyes, which had been gray, were now blank.  
  
He was standing by the window again that led out to a balcony. He had me wrapped in his arms, like a bride. He leaned me against the stone and breathed by my ear. I was wrapped tightly around him, we were almost two stories up, and he was in such a funny mood.  
  
"I'd never feel any guilt."  
  
It rang through my mind and I knew to the depths of my graying soul that it was true.  
  
KNOCK.  
  
It rang throughout the house. He tensed against me before letting me go, laying me on the foot of stone that the balcony was. I didn't move, I was afraid even to breathe.  
  
He slipped a cigarette out of a silver case and brought it to his silky lips. A pink tongue darted out to the corner of his mouth, afraid and seductive. He brought a lighter to the cigarette and inhaled slowly. The lighter fell off the balcony onto the snow and he exhaled framing and then covering his features.  
  
"You shouldn't smoke. It's bad for you," I mumbled pathetically from my perch on the balcony. He chuckled low in his throat. "Ever seen a dragon that didn't have smoke pouring out of him darling?" I trembled.  
  
There were footsteps in the Manor, and I wondered who could have gotten past the alarms. I saw him turn around and deliberately flick the butt onto a velveteen drapery. It caught flame quickly, but I couldn't move for fear of falling. He smiled at me in a sad way, almost.... regretful.  
  
He leaned down and kissed my lips. He tasted like smoke instead of the usual clean mint. I breathed sharply. He looked into my eyes. "Pet, this is it. I'm telling you goodbye, and love, it's forever," he said and gave me a cold half-smile. Then he wrapped his arms around my bare shoulders and let me go.  
  
I fell into a snowdrift and was stunned. I could see the balcony, but he wasn't on it. The doors were shut and the draperies closed, burning, I could see his shadow. The breath was gone from me and I was dazed, but I heard voices, Lupin's, Tonk's, Moony's, and a few other OOTP and Aurors. The room was filled with yelling, but Draco's voice was absent.  
  
All of a sudden the room exploded.  
  
There were screaming, acrid smells; I was shouting- Draco, Draco! - Then there was nothing, but smoke. I coughed and struggled to my feet, tried to search in the rubble. My dress was a white gown, like a bride's dress and splayed around my feet, preventing me from moving. I sat in the snow and cried.  
  
That's where they found me the next day.  
  
I was greeted and my absence and finding were overlooked and explained. I spent a year in madness.  
  
I think I might still be.  
  
We went to the funerals, Ron, Harry, Hermione, my family, and me. Lupin, Tonks, and Moody were well remembered. It was a fresh scar in their hearts, but for me... it was unhealable. I was unreachable and emotionless.  
  
Ron commented at the funeral speech. "My little sister Ginny had a crush on these fine people's murderer. Draco Malfoy was a bully and a coward Gin, see that now? Tell everyone what you think of him now."  
  
I never did.  
  
I thought he was a demon and a saint. Even to this day I cannot tell if he meant to kill all those people or only to build his own funeral pyre. When he let me fall did he mean to save me or kill me? When he cried did he hate me or love me? Probably the worst of all the answers, and he didn't care.  
  
That night Harry Potter comforted me. I didn't scream. I didn't cry. I didn't care. But, at midnight, when he lay next to me, I wanted to die.  
  
When I was 20 Harry Potter asked me to marry him. We'd been going out for about sixth months and he said he loved me. I said yes, if only to please my family. I was past pleasing.  
  
Our wedding was well publicized, well attended, and well deserving for the hero of the Wizarding World. I was hopelessly overlooked. Just the bride, the perfect bride.  
  
Our married life was less so. All assumed the perfect life, the perfect wife the tragic hero, lonely and remorseful. I never touched him again. He resented me and loved me, and I didn't care. The last time he ever touched me in public was to hug me at Ron and Hermione's wedding. I wear long sleeve shirts and he hasn't seen my shoulders for almost four years. I ignore him, ignore him......  
  
Slowly, sinfully, I let him wandered into Hermione's arms, Hermione's bed. Ron was absent, clueless in this. He loves his wife.  
  
Just this morning I walked to the flower shop. I go to the flower shop everyday, to get a dozen roses. I use the thorns to get what makes me happy- blood and roses. Everyday the balding, overweight man hands me my flowers and asks the same question. "So ma'am, are there going to be any new boys who lived?" he says with a large smile. Everyday I want to say nothing and leave the shop, but Hermione just announced a baby yesterday. "Maybe," I said with a casual wink and left the shop.  
  
And then with my little grocery bag I tottered up to the steps of a church.  
  
I'm sitting in a pew now, scribbling the last of my memoirs. I'd gone into the confessional when I got here. The old priest looked at me through the wooden mesh.  
  
"I'd like to tell you my sins, Father," I'd said.  
  
"Would you like to start with the-"he started before I cut him off. "No thank you Father. I'm not Catholic. Never have been. Never needed miracles, never needed religion. I want to tell you my sins."  
  
The old priest nodded slowly.  
  
"I've made love to a devil," I started. "I loved him and he killed, but I didn't care. I've been unfaithful to my husband with a mere memory. I've lied. I've let my husband go into the bed of my brother. I've hated."  
  
There was a silence.  
  
"I can clear you of these sins," said the troubled old man. "Are you sorry?"  
  
"No."  
  
Another pause.  
  
"There is nothing I can do then," he said.  
  
I left the confessional to write these last moments of my memories. I'll hand it to him and Harry will show up and collect the bundle of papers and read it and it will change him. It will change everyone and it will tarnish my memory. But my family will hide there shame, they never cared about blocking me from others.  
  
But, I regret nothing I've done.  
  
I don't regret what I will do.  
  
I'll go to the crumbling, blacked remains of my home, my true home. I'll take off my coat and lay it in a fire and lay in my bare-shouldered gown in the snow. Then I'll scatter roses around my head and simply...... Fall asleep.  
  
I don't regret.  
  
It's enough to say I loved him.  
  
It's enough to say goodbye.  
  
Sometimes I wonder why I waited.  
  
Adieu.  
  
~~  
  
Thorns are scratching, bleeding, thirsting,  
  
And we and our blood run free,  
  
Life in our veins thumping, bursting,  
  
In a garden of roses you and me  
  
~  
  
Bared shoulders, resolutely walking,  
  
Snow is falling all around,  
  
Over red wine we were talking,  
  
I fell to the icy ground  
  
~  
  
In your Adonis presence saving,  
  
You told me I could have stopped your fall,  
  
Bared your emotions, for once braving  
  
To me, your silly little doll  
  
~  
  
You were an angelic devil crying,  
  
You my miasma and I your death,  
  
While you saved me I kept you dying,  
  
An empty body- I stole your breath  
  
~  
  
All alone in empty church writing,  
  
Confess my sins in all their might,  
  
My demons pain me, scratching, biting,  
  
I give myself up to you- the night  
  
~  
  
My husband and I are both untrue,  
  
He with another and I with the dead,  
  
I wasn't thinking of him when I said "I do"  
  
When I close my eyes, you're in my head  
  
~  
  
All assume I live an elegant and textbook life,  
  
Of smiles and perfection  
  
A tragic hero and his smiling wife,  
  
But it's too late for that resurrection  
  
~  
  
And I wish to plummet slowly,  
  
I wish to join you in your hell,  
  
I desire to be with one that looks so holy,  
  
Like an angel that tripped and fell  
  
~  
  
LA FINE 


End file.
